A group from my church meets every other Tuesday for a book discussion. Right now we're reading Everybody's Normal Till You Get to Know Them, which deals with the need for (and challenges of) community. Our group had a good discussion this week about why people in our culture have so much difficulty connecting with one another in any meaningful way. We agreed that the biggest deterrent is overcommitted schedules that leave little time for anything beyond surface conversations.

One member of our group - a sincere, thoughtful, soft-spoken man - seems particularly interested in getting beyond the small talk that characterizes most conversations. After the study, I approached him and his wife, hoping to get to know them better. Since I know we have similar family backgrounds, this seemed like the perfect topic for a beyond-small-talk conversation. We briefly compared stories, but the man's wife seemed unfocused, her eyes darting around the room as we talked. He had to excuse himself suddenly as he realized a couple he wanted to talk to was about to leave for the evening. Our conversation lasted, at the most, a minute and a half.

I headed for the snack table, grabbed a cookie, and joined the group in the kitchen for our usual small talk.

I was getting ready to go out Saturday night when a giant roach appeared on my bathroom sink, right next to my curling iron. I sprayed the offending creature with Raid, and then became paranoid about breathing the fumes. The rest of my preparation process was spent holding my breath as long as possible while I worked on my hair, dashing into the hallway for a gasp of air, then going back to the bathroom for another round. The things we women go through....

Once again, I didn’t get the job.

For the second time in recent months, a promising opportunity fell through because an unexpected internal candidate came along. But the disappointing news came with one of the best compliments I’ve ever received about my writing. This, coming from the head of Public Relations for a large health system, went a long way in offsetting my disappointment.

I relayed the conversation to a group I had dinner with that evening, and one guy got on a soapbox about how potential employers should just deliver the bad news, and forego any words of praise.

I wanted to tell the guy, “Don’t rain on what’s left of my parade.”

A friend told me about stopping by his barber shop on a workday, right after an off-site meeting. Though he had a flexible schedule that allowed for such things, a co-worker harassed him about getting his hair cut "on company time." My friend's response: "Well, it grew on company time."

My next-door-neighbor is a pretty good guy, but most of our conversations center around his grousing about one thing or another. During last summer's brief gas shortage, he was waiting in line for his turn at the tank when another man cut in front of him. My neighbor yelled out, "You [insert not-very-nice word here]!" When he told his wife about the experience, she responded, "What do you think Karen would have done in that situation?"

What am I, the neighborhood Goody-Two-Shoes?

Something I've discovered after writing professionally for years (the exact number of which shall remain undisclosed):

I never get tired of seeing my byline.

Shallow, aren't I?

I spent hours preparing for a job interview this morning, but could not possibly have anticipated this question: "If you could invite five people, living or dead, to a dinner party, who would you invite and why?"

Knowing I didn't really have time to give significant thought to my answer, I started rattling off random names of people I would consider either interesting to talk to or fun to be around. I hope my interviewer won't give significant weight to my answer, because I came up with a pretty odd assortment: Oswald Chambers, Erma Bombeck, Abraham Lincoln, CS Lewis and David Letterman.

I'll probably spend the next week mentally revising my guest list.

The W-2 and 1099 forms are pouring in from last year's myriad jobs and freelance clients. I'm glad I have an accountant to deal with such things, since taxes from an ordinary year are overwhelming to the underdeveloped math side of my brain.

I went to a Super Bowl party yesterday, and watched no more than 30 seconds of the game. Most of the party was spent around an outdoor fire pit, talking with friends and eating. In my book, that's a great Super Bowl party.